What We Did to Gain 3,000 GitHub Stars for the Liam Repository

Recently, the Liam repository exceeded 3,000 stars just three months after its release. The repository continues to gain stars, alongside increases in traffic, forks, and external contributions. These stars didn't accumulate naturally—they were the result of proactive strategies. In this article, I'll share our thinking and the strategies we implemented to achieve 3,000 GitHub stars. What is Liam ERD? Liam ERD is the first product under the Liam brand, a tool that easily generates beautiful ER diagrams automatically from database schemas. It's released as open-source software with the goal of growing alongside the community. Liam ERD Automatically generates beautiful and easy-to-read ER diagrams from your database. liambx.com Setting 3,000 GitHub Stars as a KPI We set 3,000 GitHub stars as our KPI for the following reasons: We are currently developing a paid product in the database design space based on Liam ERD We wanted to significantly expand recognition for the first product under the Liam brand GitHub stars are a public metric that serves as a leading indicator of user trust1 Strategies Found from Predecessors Having set GitHub stars as our KPI, what specific actions should we take? Throughout my career as a software engineer, I've developed OSS individually and created OSS repositories for companies, but I had never promoted a company's OSS. Also, blatant promotion isn't something I personally prefer. I consulted Google and ChatGPT, but ultimately found an article featured on the Star History website.

Apr 21, 2025 - 10:02

What We Did to Gain 3,000 GitHub Stars for the Liam Repository

Recently, the Liam repository exceeded 3,000 stars just three months after its release. The repository continues to gain stars, alongside increases in traffic, forks, and external contributions.

These stars didn't accumulate naturally—they were the result of proactive strategies.

In this article, I'll share our thinking and the strategies we implemented to achieve 3,000 GitHub stars.

What is Liam ERD?

Liam ERD is the first product under the Liam brand, a tool that easily generates beautiful ER diagrams automatically from database schemas. It's released as open-source software with the goal of growing alongside the community.

Liam ERD

Automatically generates beautiful and easy-to-read ER diagrams from your database.

liambx.com

Setting 3,000 GitHub Stars as a KPI

We set 3,000 GitHub stars as our KPI for the following reasons:

We are currently developing a paid product in the database design space based on Liam ERD
We wanted to significantly expand recognition for the first product under the Liam brand
GitHub stars are a public metric that serves as a leading indicator of user trust¹

Strategies Found from Predecessors

Having set GitHub stars as our KPI, what specific actions should we take?

Throughout my career as a software engineer, I've developed OSS individually and created OSS repositories for companies, but I had never promoted a company's OSS. Also, blatant promotion isn't something I personally prefer.

I consulted Google and ChatGPT, but ultimately found an article featured on the Star History website.